Photo TR: Schlittercon, Congo River Expedition. and BBQ

[Rastuso]

A quick report from New Braunfels. This is becoming a yearly visit to the 'bahn, but this year was special since I hit the big 4-0 today, and yes I'm quite crabby about it. I was going to do my first skycoaster ride today, but we get a free one tomorrow, so that's the plan.

 

The event didn't start officially until dinner today, but we could get in the park all day. We were going to get there about dinner time, since the park would be packed since it was Saturday. However, a storm rolled through and probably closed the park for a while anyway. After that, it was a bit cooler than I like it at Schlitterbahn, especially the old section where everything is fed with Comal River water that was probably about 60 degrees today. It's great on a mega-hot Summer day, but pretty damn cold if it's not in the 90s.

 

For lunch, we drove to Luling to go to City Market, a world famous BBQ joint. This place just reeks of Americana. It's in a tiny town in B-F-Texas, it was stormy, yet there was still an enormous line snaking through the place. Two separate lines, one for drinks and sides, another for the main attraction. This place does one thing right, and that's all they deal with. You have 4 choices, brisket and ribs by the pound, and two types of sausage by the link. I got a pound of each and one hot link. The BBQ is served in a back room, separated from the restaurant. It's hot and smells of world class 'que back there, and a guy in a hard hat opens big pits full of meat, like they use the fires of hell to cook the stuff. They put the meat on a center table in a pile, weigh off your order, and put in on a big piece of paper. After you pay, you fold up the paper and take it to your table. If you so choose, they have a very tangy, mustardy sauce to add to it. And damn, they know how to smoke and grill meat. Plenty of delicious burnt ends, fall of the rib perfection, and some very good, not to fatty sausage. I made a complete pig of myself. This place ranks with the greats: Jack Stack in KC, Montgomery Inn in Cincy, and my local fave, Pappa's. They close at 6, which is odd, and DO NOT be fooled by the pedestrian copycat Luling City Market in Houston, that's shit. You want City Market in Luling, Texas.

 

They had signs up for the upcoming Watermelon Thump Queen competition. Again, this place was just fabulous.

 

After that, we headed to Schlitterbahn. We go to the far West entrance of the old park, get our writstbands, and head to the Congo area. The park was empty because of the storms that rolled through, so it was walk on for EVERYTHING. And that's mighty unusual for Schlitterbahn. the first 30 seconds was a serious shock to your system, but once the major shrinkage and hypothermia set in, I was fine. I rode my fave White Water chute twice, the Castle , and Hillside all in an hour! ON any other Saturday, these would all have a one hour line minimum.

 

They then served the grub. Some gray beef kabobs, some average BBQ chicken, and sides. They also had pineapple upside down cake. I of course wasn't hungry, which was good, since it didn't seem to be going over well. But, they tried to have food with the theme of the ride, and the presentation was great. Jeffrey Seibert goes WAY farther then anyone to make ACE happy at these events. And at $25 for the event, anything more than one day admission was all gravy.

 

After some plaque presentations, they opened the ride for us. My son got on with me too, which was good to see, since he's still scared from some tube flips a few years ago.

 

The ride starts with a totally rethemed lazy river that is in the middle of the really long tube chute. You start with a long tunnel with a storm inside it. you then pass some Tiki heads, a lion, a snake, some spike traps, an elephant, and a tribe of dart shooting natives. All very well themed in basically a bamboo canyon. Very little of the ride is easily viewable from outside. Then, you have the choice to veer off into the mining cave.

 

You have a long, slow chute leading into the mine. Once entering it, you reach the top of the main feature to the ride, and splash down into a water curtain with some great animation on it. It blends perfectly with the ride, and contains some falling boulders and a few other effects. It happens quick, but it's top notch. After that, you go through a long tunnel and come out to a nice long tube chute that eventually goes to the river.

 

After a few spins, I was pretty cold, so I went to the hot tub to warm up. There was an official hot tub party at the other end of the park, but we've got an early ERT session tomorrow, so we left and headed to the second great place to eat of the day: Freddy's Custard! Kick ass burgers and fries, although I was still too full for them. But I did get one of their awesome Concretes. Thier fresh made custard with a variety of blend-ins. I got the special mint Oreo that was killer awesome.

 

Tomorrow we hit the new sections for morning and evening ERT sessions, and hopefully many spins on the Torrent River. And of course, that sky-coaster ride.

 

-RO

Freddy's!!!!!

The exit from the mine

Inside the mine. You can't get a picture of the major stunt, but it's better for you to get to Schlitterbahn to experience it.

The entrance to the ACE Mining cave. Jeffrey says the ride has multiple ACE related Easter Eggs

The queue, also with great theming.

Some of the theming

The river is super foggy

The beginning of the rain forest tunnel. Note the pile-o-tubes in the background. Those will be full of folks on a normal day.

All the queen babes had hand-made signs with pics of them seductively holding watermelons. It was pretty hot.

Time for some serous eatin'

The walls of covered with decades of BBQ awesomeness.

You keep the door closed, so as to not let the fires of Hades get out of the pit and destroy all of Texas.

The queue to the 'que

[PKI Jizzman]

Rastuso! Thanks so much for the report. As apart of the Texas trip, I can't wait to get down to Schlitterbahn. Glad to see their new ride looks fun.

 

That BBQ looks sooo tasty!

-Zach

[atem122]

That is honestly super cool, but do they have life guards inside the cave because it seems like it has the potential to be a safety nightmare if something should go wrong

[Rastuso]

The tube chute leading into the mine up to the drop is very shallow, just a few inches, so there is no lifeguard. It's more like a water slide. Once you get to the drop, there is a guard that makes sure you face forward going down the big drop, and a couple of folks at the bottom, I guess since it's sorta dark in there, and you could get disoriented.

 

Day two of Schlittercon is underway. We had a huge hot breakfast, and were on the second tube out on Master Blaster. there is a scavenger hunt again this year, and we're doing pretty good. We found 4 Congo cards and 1 of the super rare (only 5 of them) 30th anniversary ones. Last year a big group pooled their findings, so I doubt we'll win, but my son had a blast finding the hidden cards. Just one of the many little things Jeffrey Seibert does to make Schlittercon THE start of Summer.

 

I had my first skycoaster ride, and me and my son got a Dragon's Revenge and 3 Family Blaster rides in a row. DR is missing the vertigo tunnel this year, but the Dragon stunt is still great. I didn't notice anything new like they are saying. As usual, excellent scenery everywhere.

 

-RO

I'm no longer a skycoaster virgin (I'm in the middle). Pretty fun, although I was a bit dizzy afterwards from the slow spinning.

One of the scavenger hunt cards. My son found this one on the back of a pop machine.

The greatest waterslide in the world, as long as you don't have to wait 2 hours for it. And yes, the line was about that long today at 11 am.

Queue entertainment

Another pic from last night, a tiger hides in the tent.

[Rastuso]

We returned to go to the dinner, which was German sausage, chicken, and hot dogs. They gave out a free Schlitterbahn cooler to everyone, and gave prizes to the to folks in the scavenger hunt and the quiz hunt. We placed I guess 3rd in the scavenger hunt, although the winner was actually a team of many folks, including a very hot babe that was wearing a very skimpy bikini I saw asking all the lifeguards if they knew where some cards were. The number two guy was pissed, saying that the winner cheats, and he saw him going over fences into unopened areas to grab signs before anyone could even get there. I do think they mishandled this, since the top guy ended up getting two huge bags of Schlitterbahn stuff, and my son and the other guy getting a big Schlitterbahn mug. Why even have the hunt if your’re letting a mob go against everybody else.

 

We then headed over for hopefully one last Dragon’s Revenge ride, but it was about the only ride with a line anywhere, since It had stormed again and was probably in the lower 80s. We instead all rode the Family Blaster 3 times, and did a few lazy river laps. Plus, they had let too many people in the DR queue, so it had a long line at the beginning of ERT of normal folks still. So, we bailed to Blastenoff, where Master Blaster was basically a walk on for an hour. My son and I got 3 more rides, including a nighttime one, and my wife and I did many laps on the always excellent Torrent River.

 

My son didn’t want to leave, and then someone mentioned the luau. I thought it was after the night time river ride, which we skipped. But, it started immediately, and my son really wanted to go. So, we went back to the Celebrity Hot Tub Party and luau. They had a steel drum band, and were serving dessert cakes, pop, and beer. It was pretty easy to spot the non-ACErs that had gathered in the resort hot tub, since the girls were all smoking hot, and the guys all looked like frat $*#@s. After a couple hours of relaxing and talking ACE conspiracies, we left Schlittercon 09 vowing to return to Schlittercon 10. Hopefully my son will return to riding tube chutes then.

 

Thanks again to Jeffrey Seibert and Schlitterbahn for the best deal in all of ACE events.

[astroworldfan1]

Did they retheme it (or redesign) to bring more people into the ride? Because when I was there, there wasn't anyone on the lazy river by the "Soda Straws". I'm talking about the one where you climb the steps by the Soda Straws.

 

Yet, the other lazy river was PACKED!

 

-Tatum

[Rastuso]

THe Soda Straws are on the East end of the old part, aren't they? They dump into the river water pool that is the end of the Hillside Tube Chute. THere isn't a lazy river there. The only lazy river in the old park is the one on the West side, by the resort cabins. That is the one that was rethemed. Yes, it was pretty empty usually. That whole end of the park was usually dead, with the only people there being little kids and folks being dumped out of tube chutes walking back to get in another one.

 

Schotze's central park is over in this same area. I also think they totally repainted the Hansel and Gretle area recently. They are really trying to breath life in this area. Congo will do that for sure.

 

-RO

[jamesdillaman]

Jeff always was the nicest PR guy here at KI. We miss him terribly, but glad to hear he's still working his magic down at Sclhitterbahn.

 

-James Dillaman

[mike robinson]

Schlittercon was great! We have not missed one yet and always have a good time.

 

The Congo River is a nice attraction, they completly reworked the old Congo River (which was a very slow and small lazy river that you could enter from the Raging River Tube Chute) and you can take the lazy river portion of The Congo River as much as you want without entering the "MineShaft Portion"

 

The Mineshaft portion is a lot of fun with a big drop into a water curtain that has images of a door opening and falling rocks but was sometimes hard to see as the life gaurds cast shadows as they are stationed between the projector and the water screen. I think they should move the water screen and projector back about 20 feet into the tunnel after the drop.

 

As far as the scavenger hunt, I have never participated because I would rather be riding than hunting down the little signs. The group that won has won every year they have particpated and they have a plan and know the park inside out. I guess resort guests could have an advantage as they have access to the property but thats just the way it is. I don't think the group that got the most points did anything wrong. There were just a lot of them and they were organized. They just know how to win it. Its just a game! (but it seems some people take it very seriously which is pretty humorous to me)

 

The only Tube Chute I did not ride was the Raging River but that was weather related. I did get my favorite, White Water in and that is always great.

 

The park was great, Jeff was Great, the event never dissapoints. Schlitterbahn is the best waterpark and I know everyone on the Texas Trip will have a good time. The park can get crowded, but if you plan right you can get most everything in.

 

Hint, if you want to ride Masterblaster, get to Blastenhoff BEFORE the park opens and head over there as quick as you can before the line builds up, then hit Dragons Revenge and riptide and anything else you want to hit on that side of the park. Then in the afternoon hit the Tube Chutes on the old side as I have found the lines for the tube chutes really go down later in the day. Don't be intimidated by a long line for a tube chute as the lines move as quick as people can get into the water and the tube. No Dispatch times for the Tube Chutes!

 

I will post some pictures as soon as I get the film (yes actual film from a disposable waterproof camera - archaic!) back.